Tag: hiking

I personally love the feeling of walking in mud. It’s squishy and soft and makes the grossest sound as you pull your foot out of a deep mud puddle. I love it! After a heavy downpour the trails are made of slippery, chocolate brown mud! Mud doesn’t stop me!

While hiking, one periodically comes across unusual things. Recently, after an uneventful 2 miles or so I noticed the decomposing leg of a deer had been draped on a tree branch. GROSS! Of course I took a picture because I’m morbid. I won’t put it here, but if you want to see it (you sick, sick person) I won’t judge you, just send me a message!

It was a bonus unusual day. Off the trail about 50 feet was a little white cross. Someone must have buried their pet in the woods. Or was it the remains of the deer and someone put a cross over it. I decided to admire the cross from trail just in case whatever was there wasn’t completely buried!

Shelly and I didn’t waste anytime getting away from the decomposing bones!

Hiking with different people I don’t know, I generally ask them, “How do you spend your time outside of hiking?” Almost always, the answer I get is, “Work.” Well, besides that!? Next the answers are about their children or grandchildren, pets, education and travel.

When I am asked that question the first thing I want to tell people is about my family. Dave (my husband) and Carl (my son) are my most favorite people! My two golden retrievers are great hiking buddies, too!

Another hobby I enjoy is hand crafting homemade greeting cards. I have a room in my house dedicated to my stamps and crafts! I also love Halloween, cooking and reading everything I can about the AT.

Truth be told, I really just want to talk about hiking the Appalachian Trail. I want to talk about my gear, maps, books, planning – YOU NAME IT! My hike may be 3.7 years from now (or maybe sooner if I can manage it) but I eat, sleep, and breathe the AT.

I’m planning a trip to Gatlinburg, TN in late April and plan to visit many trails there. I had made a promise to myself to not hike any of the AT until I started my thru hike. I wanted everything to be new on the trail. Now I have a chance to go to Clingman’s Dome! I should do it, right? Or, should I not? I should. Maybe not. Ugh!

In reality I should be focusing on planning and preparing for a backpacking trip I am taking to the Allegheny National Forest in ONE WEEK! Shelly and I are spending one night on a trail out there. I’m very nervous about putting up my tent. I will be practicing it over and over in my yard this week! I’ll be documenting my success or lack thereof!

As you can tell, it is Spring and I’m excited for backpacking season to begin. I’m looking forward to wearing my heavier pack on some trails to get more accustomed to it.

Happy Trails and thanks for following my adventures in training for my thru hike of the AT!

I hadn’t worn my boots in over a week. It’s funny how I began to miss them! My name was sitting on a “waitlist” for a hike to chase waterfalls in a nearby State Park. I checked my phone for alerts every half hour hoping my name would be put on the “confirmed” list. I woke up at 7:00 a.m. the day of the hike and saw that I was finally confirmed. Enough people had backed out, clearing a spot for me! Jumping out of bed and scaring the dogs, I hurried to shower and pack my backpack.

The December day was forecast to be in the 60’s and nice. I was looking forward to being outside and among friends on the trail. Stepping outside it was foggy, damp and dreary – it did not look promising. Driving to the park it began to sprinkle. It still felt more like an April day than a December day, so I carried on.

The group was beginning to assemble at the meeting point and it started to rain harder. People were changing their RSVPs to No every couple minutes and before we knew it, we had only 14 people instead of 25. The rain was putting sour faces on most of us, but no one backed out. We all hoped it would stop soon and lucky for us it did.

Fog was still settled below.

We were chasing down a number of waterfalls in the park and since there hadn’t been much rain, except for the little that fell early in the morning, the waterfalls were only trickling.

Our leader, Chuck took us past interesting old ruins of park infrastructure. The park was built in the 30’s and many of the old stone incinerators and mysterious buildings remain. A few took us a minute to figure out what they might have been used for. I still don’t know what this large dog house building would be. It had no floor – only mud, trash and a large pipe running through it.

We eventually chased down a few waterfalls. Not very exciting this time of year with no water rushing over them, but beautiful, just the same.

Just a trickle. I swear there is a waterfall here.

Chuck said this one wasn’t on his list, but it was flowing better than any of the other waterfalls!

There’s a teeny tiny waterfall in the middle of this picture. It didn’t make Chuck’s list either.

This hike felt different to me than any other so far. I was talking to everyone, breathing easily and having so much fun. My feet were even smiling in my boots! There were a couple of challenging, steep inclines and I was glad I brought my hiking poles. They sure do come in handy. Chuck had us walking in the creek bed in order to view another waterfall. The creek bed was SLIPPERY! Those poles saved me from getting wet! So did Ali – my happy Drill Sargent was there lending a supportive hand and motivational words whenever I needed it!

At the edge of the park there was a marker engraved with the name, Cliford Robert Pettis, State Forester. Of course, I had to “Google” his name! Turns out he was named the “Father of Reforestation” and was the New York State Forest Superintendent from 1910-1927. Seems this man was responsible for the planting of 20,000,000 trees in New York State. Here is a website if you want to learn more: https://localwiki.org/hsl/Clifford_R._Pettis.

Nearing the end of the hike we were climbing and climbing. My heart was beating out of my chest! My face was RED! I reminded myself that this is why I am in training for my thru-hike of the Appalachian Trail. As long as I am still breathing I will get through it! I concentrated on my slow even breathing and setting small little goals. For example on one steep section of trail I concentrated on different shape rocks ahead of me and told myself to get to that one rock, then the next rock, then the next weird looking root, then the next bright leaf in trail. Sometimes these goals were only 2 feet apart, but it worked!

Luckily the last steep climb landed us right at the parking lot near our cars. I quickly caught my breath and we said our farewells. My muddy boots and poles needed a little TLC.